


Lime and Cherry Pie

by GamblingDementor



Series: Out of Oz on the farm [1]
Category: The Wicked Years Series - Gregory Maguire
Genre: Alternate Universe − Farmers, Baking, F/F, Fluff, lesbian farmers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-03
Updated: 2018-06-03
Packaged: 2019-05-17 21:18:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,346
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14839350
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GamblingDementor/pseuds/GamblingDementor
Summary: If Gregory Maguire was too cowardly to give us the true ending, which is Elphie and Glinda running away to become lesbian farmers, then I'll have to write that myself. And I just did.In which Elphaba escapes a storm and Glinda bakes a pie.





	Lime and Cherry Pie

Thunder in the distance announces the storm and drives Killyjoy mad with excitement. His tail wagging and in the way, Elphaba can barely walk straight out of the fenced patch she has been plowing all afternoon. So much for salads. They'll for wait the storm to pass.

 

"You stupid thing," she nudges him with her knee and even his yelp of pain is cheerful. "You'll get us caught in the…"

 

A bark and more tail wagging is her only answer in interruption. On the dry desert dirt where they have settled their homestead, sparse drops of rain are already starting to dot around, an accidental painting of blacks and browns and sepias. The graying sky is about to burst into tears, and by the looming look of it, sooner rather than later.

 

"Ow!"

 

Against her bare arms in the heavy heat of a late summer afternoon, Elphaba feels the first droplets hit, leaving a burn that will want bandaging once she gets home. She runs.

 

It's a short way from the fields to the little cottage she built them. The two of them alone in this sketch of a hamlet, there is no need to spread out farther than necessary. Still, with only the lightest jacket Elphaba snatched back from the fence she had dropped it on just after lunch, wrapped tight around herself, with the sky pouring hell, she's almost afraid there will be nothing left of her by the time she reaches the back door of the kitchen − the closest.

 

"What the…"

 

"Elphie?" Glinda's voice is hidden somewhere in the midst of a cloud of smoke shrouding their small kitchen. "Is that you? Darn it, back already…"

 

In the blind thickness, Elphaba tries to lock the door behind her, not helped in the least by Killyjoy yapping to be let out again. So be it, he'll whine. Glinda would not appreciate the mud about the house, as modest as the place is.

 

"My apologies," Elphaba replies and tries to localize Glinda, her arms reaching into nothing. The room feels warm, but no more than Elphaba left it a few hours ago. Whatever trouble Glinda got herself into, at least she's not burning down their home. It wouldn't be the first mishap in the kitchen. "I didn't realize you'd wished for a puddle delivered by your doorstep. I'll show myself right out while you put our house to flames."

 

Soft fingers wrap around her arm, pulling and out of the cloud appears Glinda's face. Her entire left cheek is smudged with flour and some pink fruit stained her lips. Altogether too lovely, she ought to be thoroughly kissed.

 

"Oh, don't be daft," Glinda retorts, pinching Elphie's arm. For a newly made homesteader housewife still inexperienced in all ways of running a home, she looks significantly more relaxed about the fire hazard that seems to have happened in their own home than Elphaba would have expected. "I thought you'd be back later, that's all."

 

"It's raining."

 

"Oh, is it?" There she goes again, disappeared into the smoke. When she speaks again, Elphaba figures she has moved closer to the window. She has the good sense of keeping it shut to hold the rain out, though some fresh air would do this place a lot of good. "I hadn't noticed."

 

"Yes, I can tell," Elphaba notes dryly, though her expression falls through if Glinda cannot see it. "Would you care to explain the smoke or will you let me figure that one out for myself?"

 

"Hush, it was supposed to be a surprise," Glinda says for only answer. "As if you were the talented baker who never burned anything."

 

Elphaba laughs. Slowly escaping through the chimney, the smoke is starting to dissipate and she can see her poor Glinda looking cross, hugging herself. A few steps and she wraps her arms around her failed baker, kisses her pouts away. Glinda melts into the embrace, she always does. Her dirty hands grabbing Elphaba's face, she pulls her close, her lips demanding an apology on account of Elphaba's teasing.

 

"Elphie," she whispers softly, her hand cupping Elphaba's face, stroking it with the back of her thumb as they break away. "Go clean up, you reek of too much farm work."

 

Elphaba laughs again, though she supposes that after a day's work outside planning for their autumn crops, the attack is not unfounded.

 

"You should have thought of that before you took me up on the offer to run away out here, my love," she says but she finds her way out of the cloudy kitchen nonetheless, saluted by the echo of Glinda's snort. Behind her, she hears the clicks of Glinda opening the windows, waiting for Elphaba to be gone and out of reach for any rain.

 

Even alone in the quiet of the empty bathroom, she finds herself smiling at no one, at herself. It's a beautiful life they have started here in the deserts out of Oz and though it's only the beginning, Elphaba thinks she might just have been happier in the few short months since they laid down the first bricks of their little home than in the rest of her years. They have found a real paradize of an oasis. During the day, she sows and Glinda cooks, she harvests and Glinda cleans, she plows and Glinda rests − even now, she likes her bit of comfort in the shade of their little farm house. They've made this secret patch of land far from everything and most importantly, everyone, their own. Elphaba has stretched all her crops across their little field and made it survivable, Glinda has put a touch of her magic that has nothing to do with her wand and everything to do with Glinda herself to it and made it home. There is a little bit of them in every wall, ever window.

 

"Ah," she grins to herself, grabbing the bottle from the neat arrangement of toiletries Glinda has been keeping − who knows what she might have to do when she runs out, but there is still a bit of time to think of that. "She finished the batch."

 

As of recent, Glinda has been making fruit flavored everything. The remnants of the summer harvests have been put to use everywhere in the house and most recently, Glinda bragged about her concept of a strawberry-flavored oil for Elphaba to wash herself with. Elphaba does not care much for perfumes and pretty things, but she cares for Glinda and, uncorking the bottle and being overwhelmed with the strong fruity scent, she supposes that might just be the price of it.

 

There is a calm to this place. Not just the bathroom, though this place too. Tucked upstairs just in the angle of the roof, it's a small room and when it rains, it shakes with all the elements. It would be a frightening sensation if Elphaba hadn't built this house from the ground up and knew it to be sturdy. Hearing the battling downpour outside only reminds her of how comfortable the inside is. She sits on the little wooden stool she carved herself and washes herself in oil, massaging the hard toil of the day away. On the window sill inside, one of their cats is staring out at the storm.

 

"You said something about a surprise," she reminds Glinda once she has taken care of her burns and put on her night gown − by the look of it, the rain is only just starting and will not be done within the evening. A lighting bolt pierces the sky and flashes its blinding light across the kitchen to confirm her thoughts.

 

Glinda turns around from the counter where she was frenetically affaired and looks at Elphaba with a hardly contained smile. Hiding her surely masterpiece behind her back, she nods.

 

"I think I managed to salvage it," she says. "Here here, sit."

 

She's made a pretty dinner of their plain table, some flowers from the beds Elphaba had grow out in the front of the house first thing moving here, a cute tablecloth, their best plates. Elphaba takes her seat − she sits closest to the door, Glinda closest to their little lounge, always. They have two chairs and don't need more. With her little pink apron and the stain of flour still on her cheek, Glinda looks quite the homemaker.

 

"Now, close your eyes."

 

Elphaba smiles and humors her. Something smells sweet in the air, at any rate much better than the smoke did and better as it gets nearer and fills Elphie with softness. She hears the dulled thud of the plate on the table, feels Glinda's hand squeezing her shoulder, and that touch is softer still. Someone else, very specific someone elses would call her life blessed but Elphaba knows that the Unnamed God, if he exists and she has yet to be convinced that he does, had no hand in this. Everything good in her existence comes from what she gave herself and most of all, comes from Glinda.

 

"Now open!"

 

To Glinda's much deserved credit, the salvaging could fairly only be called a success. Some spot where the crust must have burned pretty severely has been patched up but the result is pleasant enough. By the way the filling falls a bit flat and the pans sit piled up in the sink, Elphaba would guess Glinda still might need a few orchard harvests before getting the hang of something as simple as cooking fruit. The Arduenna household surely must have had a cook. But then, the Thropps had Nanny so it's not like Elphaba can talk, and so she doesn't.

 

"It's a lime and cherry pie!"

 

So Elphaba can see. Some bright green lime custard and here and there, dots of pink cherry. Under Glinda's watchful eyes, she takes a bite and groans into it.

 

"Dear Oz," she says through her chewing. "Glinda, this is a miracle."

 

"Isn't it splendid? Does it taste just like your childhood?" Glinda asks excitedly, serving herself a much more significant slice than the one she offered Elphaba.

 

Elphaba takes another bite. How bitter the lime, but with the cherries' sugary softness, it could almost seem sweet. She thinks of her childhood, the damp grayness of Quadling Country.

 

"I don't think so."

 

She plays with a bit of crust on the side of her plate, pushing it around, digging for some more of that pink deliciousness. The bottom is a bit black, a bit messy, but she wouldn't have it any other way. She grew the wheat that made this dough. Glinda turned it into something beautiful. Glinda's work in the kitchen combining with hers out on the fields. It tastes good. It tastes perfect with imperfection.

 

"The Pertha Hills were rather colder than here," Glinda remarks through a mouthful that could have easily been three decent-sized bites. "I don't think I've ever seen so much citrus in my life before this summer."

 

"Nor I. Quadling Country is… not very fertile. This place is truly special."

 

Glinda smiles and reaches across the table to hold Elphaba's hand. Handling the fork one handed is a small price for tenderness. Under the table, Killyjoy has fallen asleep.

 

"I wish I could have seen you when you were a little kid."

 

Elphaba smirks.

 

"You don't," she says. "I was painfully shy, and angry when I wasn't. Mama would call me the Dragon when I was in a mood."

 

"Which was often?" Glinda correctly suggests. She eats another humongous bite of pie − will there be anything left by the time Elphaba is done with her own portion? "I was sometimes in a mood when I was little but, well, Ama Clutch couldn't stand it, so she wouldn't let it happen."

 

"With a cuddle, or with a strike of the rod?" Elphaba teases.

 

Glinda nudges her foot under the table.

 

"Wouldn't _you_ like to know…"

 

Silence fills the room.

 

It used to feel different. Around others, silence was a threat, a mockery. There was the stunned silence of meeting any new person, the silence of their refusal to any camaraderie. The silence of loneliness. There is love in every silence now. Glinda, who loves to talk, lets Elphie have her bit of peace and indulges in the quiet. At night, when they lay in their little bed entwined, the silence of their homestead in the desert is an embrace as warm as Glinda's. The silence of peace, finally.

 

"The pie was good," she says eventually after saucing the last remnants of it off her plate. "Thank you, my love. You keep me so well taken care of. And the house. And the cats, and…"

 

The words fail her, however much there is on her heart she wishes to say. But then, Glinda gives her the silence of understanding. Her eyes are a picture of utter adoration, her lip quivering with restraint.

 

"Why, Miss Elphaba, what a poetic soul you have grown…" And indeed, if any breathing being would make Elphaba believe in the existence of souls, it could only be Glinda. Unfounded as it all seems, there is an attractive notion to them being soul-bound. "You would almost make me feel guilty to leave those dishes unwashed till the morning. Even a good homemaker needs a bath after a day's work."

 

She gathers the plates, piles them into the sink, putting a towel over the last slice against the cats. Plumbing must have been the hardest part about building a house for Elphaba, who could never suffer the touch of water. For Glinda, she did it all.

 

"I'd offer to wash them for you, only…"

 

"Don't be silly," Glinda giggles, grabbing her by the arm rather more firmly and decidedly than a small witch like her should be able to move around her much taller lover. "You're coming with me."

 

Of course, there is no plan to bring about Elphaba's tragic demise per means of bath. She sits patiently on her little stool as far away from the tub as she can. A candle burns on the dresser − another strawberry-perfumed creation. Its light is almost too faint for the room, so heavy and dark the storm is still unleashing outside, but it's a luck that Elphaba knows Glinda's form by heart.

 

"I hope you're not bothered by the rain," Glinda says, her leg up in the air as she rubs it clean from whatever mischief she got herself into all day long. There is soap foam in her hair from where she washed it, but she hasn't rinsed it off.

 

"I'm here with you, my darling," Elphaba replies, leaning more comfortably and enjoying the view. "How could I ever be bothered?"

 

Glinda throws her a playful glance and switches legs. She rubs so very softly, seductively, knowing without looking back the full effect of what she's doing on Elphaba. The fuzz at her calves, the elegant shape of them, how very beautiful the gesture. Elphaba curses water more than ever for forbidding her from sweeping Glinda up in her arms and carrying her to that bed of theirs.

 

"I meant about the crops," Glinda says evenly. "Too much water, that might harm the harvests, would it not?"

 

Elphaba, who wants to be thinking of no crops or harvests or rain, nods.

 

"It might, but in this desert of a place, it might do them some good. If it's better tomorrow, then I'll check the fields and assess. My love, your cheek."

 

Glinda rubs her cheeks clean and sighs heavily, stretching her arms behind her. The layer of foam is not near thick enough to cover the pretty shape of her… Elphaba gulps.

 

"Can you fetch the jug?"

 

Elphaba jumps to her feet to grab the pottery jug from the shelf behind her. In barely a heartbeat of not looking, she turns back and finds Glinda teasing insufferably again. A hand infuriatingly under water in places Elphaba can only imagine for the time being, the other reaches out to Elphaba, who drops the jug into it and gets back to her stool of frustration. The steam of the water has made Glinda's skin very pink indeed, and not just her face. Diving the pot under water to fill it, she looks at Elphie faking annoyance.

 

"Elphie, your leg."

 

Elphaba slaps a hand against her thigh to stop the involuntary shaking. Next to her, the candle is smelling so very sweet, overwhelming.

 

"You're an impatient one, you know that?" Glinda tssks. Lifting the heavy jug cautiously, she pours it onto her hair and there cannot be any accident in the way her other hand palms her own body, the lingering touches that Elphaba wishes she could mirror. "How like a child."

 

"On the contrary," Elphaba retorts, her hand tapping against her knee. In the tub, Glinda takes her wash cloth to her chest and back. "I have been a saint of patience. If it were up to me, we would have fled away straight from Lake Chorge up to here. Instead, we waited all the way to graduation." She hesitates before adding the rest, but seeing the wicked grin on Glinda's face at the memory of their first kiss, she goes on, "Besides, my wish to see you out of this bath is nothing like a child's, let me assure you. They are very much an adult's thoughts."

 

In the heat of the bathroom, the blush on Glinda's cheeks could almost have an excuse.

 

"You are insatiable," she notes but the smile at her lips says otherwise. "I had planned a quiet night in, reading books by the fire."

 

"No, you hadn't."

 

"I hadn't, but I might have," Glinda says, but she shakes her head. "With all that gust outside, we might as well leave the quiet evening for another night. My towel, please."

 

Glinda stands in the water and Elphaba pretends to be unfazed. She blinks a few times. The plumpness of her since they moved here, the same beauty of always.

 

" _Now_ who is the impatient one?" She smirks, but she passes Glinda her towel all the same.

 

"Hush and go wait for me. I'll be a minute."

 

Elphaba is sure she cannot have imagined the hand at her behind as she leaves the room. Their bed is narrow, probably narrower than a bed made for two should be, but she tells herself every night that she could not abide being too far from Glinda anymore, even if the distance was just in arm's reach. Once brought together, they are inseparable. There's a bit of Glinda with her every day out in the field, and she knows that Glinda keeps her in her thoughts as well − she says so every night when she tells Elphaba about all the events of the day. If only she had known how much there was to this simple life.

 

"You were saying something about adult thoughts?" Glinda interrupts her all too rosy thoughts.

 

Clad in the towel and nothing else, she smells of fruity perfume, of the desire thriving in Elphaba's heart, of home. She unties the knot and the towel falls to the ground. Elphaba gulps, clutching the bed cover tight. Glinda walks up to her and even being smaller, she looms over Elphaba sitting on the bed. Cupping her face, she presses a kiss against the corner of her mouth, and another one on the lips. Her damp hair prickles Elphaba's skin. She stares helplessly.

 

"Can you still hear the storm?" Glinda asks. Elphaba nods. "It'll be over by the time I'm done with you."

 

It's a flurry of laugh and gasps and whispers and sighs under rough cotton sheets, lasting all evening and more.

 

They eat the last slice of pie off the same plate the next morning. The rain has passed. In their rocking chair on their little porch and with Glinda in her lap embracing her in her sluggish tenderness of the morning, Elphaba tells herself she could suffer a hundred more storms as long as she can find refuge in Glinda's arms in their little farm.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Please I beg of you, leave a comment. I've been feeling horrible about not being able to write and I'd really like some encouragement.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Wildflowers](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18237347) by [show_me_the_universe](https://archiveofourown.org/users/show_me_the_universe/pseuds/show_me_the_universe)




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